


Tonsured

by ryme_intrinseca



Category: Stanton & Barling - E.M. Powell
Genre: First Kiss, Fluff, Head Shaving, Kissing, M/M, Post-Case
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-13
Updated: 2021-02-13
Packaged: 2021-03-13 02:29:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,235
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28770870
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ryme_intrinseca/pseuds/ryme_intrinseca
Summary: "Barling… You’ve not got fleas, have you?”Appalled and offended, Barling reared back. “I have not!”Of course not. No flea would dare bite the King’s clerk. But still… Stanton’s puzzlement grew. “Then why are you always scratching at your head?”
Relationships: Aelred Barling/Hugo Stanton
Comments: 3
Kudos: 2
Collections: Chocolate Box - Round 6





	Tonsured

**Author's Note:**

  * For [DoreyG](https://archiveofourown.org/users/DoreyG/gifts).



> Takes place after the events of _The Canterbury Murders_.

A steady rain fell, closing in the view from the window. Not that there was much to see, even on the clearest day. This part of Watling Street was flat, cutting through mile after mile of muddy fields with barely a rise or fall to give the landscape any definition. The inn was more of the same: functional and dull, run by honest, hardworking folk who minded their own business and made sure the food was hot and the rooms were clean.

And thank God for that, because Hugo Stanton had had enough of murdering, thieving, ungodly bastards to last him a lifetime.

He leaned one shoulder against the window frame and looked out as he idly peeled a wizened apple with his belt-knife. Mist had gathered, and though it was only mid-afternoon, the day felt much more advanced.

A fire crackled and spat in the small hearth, bringing a bit of much-needed cheer to this dreary place. The chimney wasn’t drawing as well as it ought, and the atmosphere was not unpleasantly smoky. The woodsmoke mingled with the smell of damp leather and wet wool from their boots and cloaks set close to the fire to dry.

Silvered drops of rain collected beneath the eaves. Stanton wondered which one of the droplets would fall first. If he’d been in his cups and amongst congenial company, he might have had a bet on the outcome, but he was disappointingly sober and his companion seemed to eschew the very concept of congeniality.

Ah, that wasn’t true. Stanton cut a slice of apple and chewed on it, the flesh tart and sweet on his tongue. Barling wasn’t what one would call merry company—not like Stanton’s fellows when he rode in service of the King. God’s blood, he’d had some wild times, drinking and wenching and waking with a sore head and empty purse with the lust to do it all over again.

No, the King’s clerk, Aelred Barling, was something better than a body to go out roistering with. Barling might not crack jokes or have a prodigious appetite for ale, and right enough he possessed a sharp tongue and could be sniffily judgemental, but he was a good man and a true friend.

Perhaps the best friend Stanton had ever had.

He sliced another piece of apple and rolled himself around in the window-opening to survey the room. It was better than the lodgings Barling had arranged for them in Canterbury, but not as smart as the accommodation they’d enjoyed in Lichfield. There they’d stayed in a fine timbered house close by the cathedral. A cheerful maidservant with a raucous laugh had attended to their needs. Not even Barling’s sour looks could dim Aggie’s sunny mood, and as it turned out, her healing skills had come in useful.

Barling sat a distance from the fire, a desk placed before him and his notes spread upon it. One day soon they’d need to hire a third horse, just to carry the clerk’s accounts.

Stanton grinned around a mouthful of mushed apple. If it made Barling happy to have his notes at hand, then Stanton would gladly carry them. As far as Jerusalem, if need be. Although he very much hoped they’d not be sent on another pilgrimage. His soul was cleansed about as well as it could be, given the sins he’d committed. Doubtless he’d go on to commit several more, wittingly or unwittingly. He could always rely on Barling to inform him of his transgressions.

The clerk was hunched over like a jackdaw, frowning at his work and steadily adding to the slow crawl of script. His right hand rested on the slope of the desk, the once pristine bandages now looking a bit grubby thanks to their days of travel. With his uninjured left hand, Barling painstakingly compiled what was no doubt a full account of their latest case—the safe return of the precious Gospels of St Chad.

When Barling uncramped his fingers from around the stylus with a pained sigh, Stanton offered, “I can do that for you.”

“Thank you, but I am perfectly capable of writing for myself.” Barling’s tone was testy. They’d been discussing this subject ever since they’d left Lichfield.

“I don’t doubt it, but it would still be easier if you accepted my help.” Stanton lobbed the apple core out of the window and stretched. Swinging his arms—God’s teeth, he was restless today! The weather, no doubt—he wandered closer to the fire to cast a curious glance over the notes.

Barling sniffed, his chin lifting slightly as if to meet the unintended challenge. He laboured at his notes, gripping the stylus so tight his knuckles shone pale. Even with the effort it was costing him, the words he formed were crabbed and untidy. Worse, the stylus, cut to suit the angle of his right hand, kept bleeding ink.

Barling hissed out a breath as he blotted the page.

Stanton lounged against the mantelpiece, toasting his backside. “I am remarkably good at taking dictation.”

That earned him a frigid glare, as if he’d said something obscene. “You can help me by being silent, Stanton.”

Grinning, Stanton abandoned his place at the hearth and sauntered around the room. As was only right and proper, this was one of the larger chambers available, with fancy carving along the mantelpiece and packets of sweet herbs tucked into corners. The bed was heaped with blankets, although the pillow looked lumpy. 

Stanton’s own room across the corridor was smaller and lacked a fireplace. Upon their arrival earlier, he’d lain down on the narrow cot provided for his rest and his feet had dangled off the end. Now he cast a covetous eye over Barling’s much more comfortable bed. Long enough for his height, and wide enough for two, it was.

He glanced at Barling, a smile dancing over his lips. How would the clerk react if he asked to share his bed? Send him packing with a tirade of tongue-lashings, probably. But it was a nice thought nonetheless. A bit of human touch never hurt anyone, and God’s eyes but he missed the ease of it. The warmth and companionship. The knowledge that, just in that moment, he wasn’t alone.

Barling muttered something and scratched out the last line. He slumped forward as if utterly weary and passed his bandaged hand over his head. Only the tips of his fingers showed, and he couldn’t do much with those. His action ruffled his hair, making it stick up in wild disarray.

Stanton grinned at the sight. The clerk was so insistent on everything having its proper order, and was so meticulous in his dress and presentation, he would be horrified to know that his hair stood up in fetching little cow-licks.

Maybe Stanton should do something about it. Offer to comb it flat or stroke it smooth or… He moved closer without really being conscious of what he was doing.

On the open road under a drear sky, Barling’s hair was a shade of dun, but here, glimmered by the firelight, it took on a richer hue, full of strands of gold and copper. Like the shaggy coat of Lord de Glanville’s favourite mastiff, or the burnished colour of the King’s high-stepping bay gelding, the one Stanton had so loved to groom.

He shook himself out of his thoughts. Barling was cradling his hand again, staring at it with such a wretched countenance that Stanton’s heartstrings were well and truly plucked.

“I’m sorry you were injured,” he said, the apology no less sincere for its repetition over the last week. “You should’ve let me handle it.”

Barling gave him the kind of look a thrush gives a worm. “And how, exactly, would that have improved matters? You were engaged in scuffling with those ruffians,” the clerk’s austere features lifted in momentary pleasure at the alliteration, “and could not spare a breath to assist me. No, if I had not acted as I did, the Gospels of St Chad would surely have been lost forever.”

“Now there’s only a few pages lost, rather than the whole book.”

“Yes.” Barling’s expression darkened. “You would think that Bishop Richard would have shown a little more gratitude. Naturally I would have preferred to restore the Gospel to its proper place in its full, holy splendour, but the thieves had already cut away some of the carpet pages. No doubt they will be sold to adorn a Book of Hours or other devotional text.”

Stanton didn’t really care whether the Gospel ended up in the hands of a wealthy individual or if it stayed in the cathedral treasury. Either way, ordinary people wouldn’t get to see it. “So you don’t mind that your hand was caught in the muniments chest?”

He had to admire the thieves, hiding the ancient book amongst diocesan records, although he wished that the chest had not been crafted from such solid oak with so many iron bands to strengthen it.

As Barling had made to rescue the Gospels from their hiding place, one of the thieves—a chorister, for Heaven’s sake!—had leapt upon the chest, slamming the lid down hard. Barling being Barling, his instincts had been a hand-span too slow.

By some miracle, which the bishop attributed to a grateful St Chad, Barling’s hand was not broken, merely badly bruised. Thanks to Aggie’s healing paste of comfrey, self-heal, and other pungent herbs, the swelling had been much reduced, but it would be many days, perhaps weeks, until Barling regained full dexterity.

Until then, the clerk was left-handed and awkward about it.

“I suppose it’s better than being caught with your hand in the King’s mistress,” Stanton added with a touch of self-mockery. It was becoming easier to joke about such things, now Barling knew the truth of it. His grief and rage over Rosamund’s death had left a scar such as the one the Roulfs had gifted him with, but Barling’s quiet acceptance and understanding was going a long way towards mending both wounds. 

“Of course I mind,” Barling snapped, bristling like a hedgehog poked with a stick. He raised his bandaged right hand and rubbed it over his head again. “That’s not what I meant.”

“I know what you meant. I’m jesting.”

Barling resumed his notes. “I do not understand your need for japery.”

“It passes the time.” Stanton assumed an innocent, hopeful expression. “If my being here disturbs you, I could always sit down below.”

“In the alehouse.” The way Barling’s lip curled as he spoke made it sound as if they had rooms above Hell itself.

To be fair, Stanton could understand some of the clerk’s mistrust of taverns. Quite aside from that business in Canterbury, there was Barling’s own history to contend with. Unimaginable though it now seemed, in his youth Barling had frequented any number of inns and alehouses in Paris in the company of his fellow students. To hear Barling’s account, he had been led astray willingly by a nobleman with whom he was in love. Ale and wine had no doubt played a role in their doomed affair. It frequently played a part in Stanton’s own romances.

Moved by an imp of mischief, Stanton said, “You could always join me.” Then with a ghost of a smile he added, “Just to reassure yourself that all is well.” He drew his fingertips lightly over the still-tender flesh of his forehead, where the Roulfs had carved a cross. “You could come and protect me.”

The pen stopped scratching. Barling lifted his pale eyes, a luminous grey sparked with gold in the light of the fire. He was still suddenly; serious. “I could have lost you, Stanton.”

“Aye. But I’m still here.” Stanton’s grin felt crooked. He hadn’t meant to dredge up memories, but the damn things had a tendency to cling.

“Thank God.” Barling’s eyes fluttered closed, his expression taut and fervent. The way he looked when he prayed.

It was like witnessing something private. Stanton glanced away and cleared his throat. “I can smell something cooking. Pies, I’ll warrant. This place is known for its pies, or it was the last time I rode this way.” On a mission for His Grace the King, God rot him. “Come down with me, Barling.”

Barling made a dismissive sound, passing his bandaged hand over his head a third time, fingertips worrying at the roundel of his tonsure. “I am not fit company for you while I look like this.”

“Look like what?” Stanton shifted to stand in front of him, hands on his hips as he made a leisurely survey. “You look like you always do. I mean, you could smile a bit more, and you definitely need a pie or two in you, but otherwise you look… well, perfect.” His heart gave an odd little thump, and he hurried to amend his remark in case Barling took it amiss: “Perfectly you, I mean.”

“You are jesting again.” Bowing his head, Barling plucked at the exclamatory ruff of his hair. He looked genuinely fraught. “I must decline your invitation, Stanton. You may go, if you please. I will be quite content here.”

He hadn’t expected anything else. The clerk disliked chatter and noise as much as he disapproved of strong drink and saucy wenches. But this didn’t seem to be the usual refusal. Something else was going on. Stanton frowned as Barling made another swipe at his unruly hair.

“Barling… You’ve not got fleas, have you?”

Appalled and offended, Barling reared back. “I have not!” 

Of course not. No flea would dare bite the King’s clerk. But still… Stanton’s puzzlement grew. “Then why are you always scratching at your head?”

Barling made an exasperated sound, both hands going up to his head. “My hair is growing! Look at it—it’s prickling my scalp, growing out my tonsure. It’s intolerable! If I lose my tonsure, I forfeit my rights as a cleric! I might as well turn apostate!”

Stanton peered at the top of Barling’s head. It was true: the perfectly smooth crown had sprouted a tiny amount of new growth, like the stubble of a wheat field after harvest. It was thicker, glossier, around the edge of the tonsure, tiny glints of fawn and gold.

“As if that’s not bad enough, it _itches_!” Barling cried, clearly at the end of his tether. His bandaged hand flailed uselessly. “How can I be expected to keep my tonsured state when we are too busy on the King’s service to loiter at a barber’s and my hand is incapacitated!”

The answer was gloriously simple, really.

“Let me do it for you.”

The flood of Barling’s complaint stopped, his mouth open and a befuddled look upon his face as he tried to process the offer. Slowly, without dropping his gaze, he shook his head. “Stanton, no. It is—it is not seemly.”

“Seemly be damned, I want to do this.” And he did, Stanton realised. It was suddenly, vitally important that he perform this one small task. “I can do this for you, Barling. Let me.”

Still the clerk hesitated, colour flowing and ebbing over those fine-boned, austere features. Then Barling nodded. “Very well. I would be grateful.”

“I don’t want your gratitude, all right?” The words were meant to be jocular and chivvying, but they came out gruff. Stanton busied himself splashing water into a basin and set it by the fire to take the chill from it. “This is what friends do for one another.”

“Is it?”

The wondering tone in Barling’s voice caused a sweet ache inside. Stanton hunched his shoulders against a backwash of emotion and put his mind to further practicalities. He cleared the desk of its notes and writing implements, setting in their place a clean linen cloth and the basin of warmed water. Upon Barling’s direction, he found in a beechwood box the clerk’s razor and a small cake of white Castile soap—an expensive indulgence for one who preferred simplicity.

Stanton wondered what other luxuries Barling permitted himself, and his heart beat a little faster. To cover the trembling of his hands, he requested that Barling should move the chair out from the desk so he sat with his back to the hearth.

All was ready. Stanton unlatched the razor and weighed the small blade in his hand. Perhaps he should use his own razor for the task, but such was the sense of ritual already binding him, he didn’t want to leave the room to fetch it.

He laid the razor aside and stood behind Barling, gazing down at the clerk’s stubbled crown. Stanton couldn’t resist. He brushed a finger over the rasping golden brown and saw Barling shiver. He did it again, tracing the outside edge of the tonsure, feeling the thickening of hair, noting the way it sprang from his touch, soft and silken and warm. He trailed the caress further out, smoothing some of the ruffled disorder as he’d longed to do.

Barling sat very still and made not a sound.

“I’m going to wet your head now,” Stanton announced, the words tight in his throat. “Use the soap to make a lather.”

He didn’t know why he needed to justify his actions. It wasn’t as if Barling had never been shaved by another before. The thought sent a little pricking goad through Stanton. He would try hard to make this the _best_ shave Barling had ever had.

A log collapsed in the fire, sending up a shower of dancing sparks. The flare of heat warmed Stanton’s back. He dipped the cloth in the water and squeezed it out over Barling’s scalp, chasing the droplets with his fingers, smearing wetness around and around. A few more squeezes and the water gathered pace, tracking runnels down past Barling’s neat ears and down the side of his neck to sink into the cloth of his tunic.

“Sorry.” Stanton swiped at the dribbles with the dry end of the cloth.

“It’s all right.” Barling sounded calm. As if he believed wholeheartedly in Stanton’s skill as a barber.

The knowledge boosted Stanton’s confidence. He took up the cake of soap and turned it in his hands, marvelling at its delicate fragrance and the quality that made it slip and lather within moments. With care, he rubbed the creamy foam over the tonsured crown, enjoying the contrast of gliding soap over rough stubble.

He dried his hands and picked up the razor. For a moment he stood, uncertain where to begin, unsure he could do justice to the precision Barling expected of him.

And then Barling said, quietly, “I trust you.”

Stanton bit his lip to stop the burst of emotion from escaping. He felt as he’d done the first time the King had noticed him and commended him for his talent with horses. Or the first time he’d lain with a woman and brought pleasure to her face. The first time Rosamund Clifford had beckoned him. Pride, satisfaction, wonder—all these things and more, because Barling trusted him.

He focused on his task, bending close to Barling. So close he could smell the clerk’s scent—the olive oil blend in the Castile soap and wool and ink and paper. So close he could see how Barling trembled, very finely, so it seemed like stillness.

The razor slid smoothly through the lather, leaving clear, hairless stripes in its wake. Stanton held his breath as he turned the blade, sweeping in a curve to follow the roundel of the tonsure. He was gripping the razor too tight, he realised, pressing down too hard, but Barling made not a sound of complaint.

Stanton took a step back and shook out his shoulders before bending once again. He cleaned off the blade, dipped it in water, and resumed shaving Barling’s scalp. The skin showed pink and new as it was revealed. As pink and new as the healing flesh on Stanton’s forehead.

Barling drew in a deep breath and let it out in a soft, quaking exhale.

Sweat sheened Stanton’s top lip. He licked at it, tasted salt and tension. An unruly lock of hair slipped forward to hang in his eyes. His concentration remained absolute, an act of prayer made flesh as he deftly restored Barling’s tonsure to perfection.

It was one of the most intimate things he’d ever done.

At last it was finished. Stanton brushed away a final few cut hairs, then ran his fingers over Barling’s newly-shorn crown. Then, giving in to impulse, he dropped a kiss on the exposed skin.

Shock bolted through Barling, springing him upright. “Stanton!”

The cry resonated through Stanton. His heart was pounding, his breath short, his cock rigid. He had to be careful. Barling was as skittish as an unbroken colt. The wrong touch, the wrong word, and he’d flee. Stanton drew on all his experience with nervous steeds, soothing with nonsense sounds, stroking smooth skin and soft hair. It was like falling under a spell, the both of them together.

He circled the damp hair that edged the tonsured scalp. Heat burned his cheeks. He felt wicked. Daring.

Barling hadn’t moved away. He still sat, breaths short and sharp, almost panted. The fingers of his good hand clutched at the fine wool of his tunic.

Stanton kissed his head again, lips dry and respectful. Then he moved around to stand before Barling, laid his hands on the clerk’s shoulders, and kissed the tonsured crown a third time. Open-mouthed and wet, his tongue tasting the freshly-revealed skin. Tasting soap and Barling.

He licked, first with the flat of his tongue laving the bumps and delicate indentations of Barling’s skull, then he lapped like a cat around the edge of the shaven area, curling his tongue-tip into the soft warmth of hair.

Barling made a soft, squirming noise, quickly muffled.

God’s blood, but this was exhilarating. As thrilling as riding a prime stallion over an impossible jump. As sensual as wallowing in a hot bath at the end of the day. As exciting as laying with a woman. No— _more_ exciting, for women came to him easily, but with Barling it was like coaxing a unicorn to lie in his lap.

He worked his way down with kisses, mouthing at Barling’s hair, catching strands playfully between his teeth. He kissed the clerk’s forehead, feeling the flushed heat of Barling’s skin beneath his lips.

Barling remained still, the kind of stillness that spoke of an intensity of emotion. “Stanton,” he said, his pale eyes watchful and shining and full of hope.

“Hugo,” Stanton corrected.

Those extraordinary eyes closed. “Hugo.” Barling’s lips shaped the name. “Hugo.” He repeated it like a litany. Clinging to Stanton’s Christian name as a drowning man holds tight to flotsam.

“Aelred,” Stanton growled in response, tasting the syllables. Distinct. Firm. A little sharp, like the man who owned the name. He kissed over Barling’s eyes, feeling the sweep and flutter of eyelashes. Kissed the clerk’s nose, smiling that the tip was cold despite the lambent warmth of the fire.

Barling tugged free.

A pang of regret shot through Stanton. He’d gone too far, too fast. Barling would dismiss him, send him away like he’d done before, only this time it would be harder to come back. Ah, hell, if only he’d curbed his desire, tamped down his need! If only—

“Hugo.” Barling made a clumsy grab for him, pulling Stanton down enough that he could press feverish kisses to the scar on his forehead. Mimicking him, Barling licked hesitantly, tracing the arms of the cross with the tip of his tongue.

Not even a saint could bear such sweet torment. Stanton dropped to his knees and, gathering Barling to him, kissed him full on the mouth.

And oh, Mary, Mother of God, Aelred Barling kissed him back.

Shy at first, questioning, and then with a rush of passion. With tongues tangling and plunging into the slick, hot warmth of their mouths. With moans and whispers, with bodies straining to get closer, to meld into one. Soul-stealing, bone-shaking, a kiss to end the world and all its sins.

A piece of wood cracked in the fire. Roused to his senses, Stanton swayed back on his haunches just a little way. Like hell would he pull free like a guilty man. This had meant something, and he wasn’t prepared to swear otherwise. A contented sound escaped him as he took in Barling’s kiss-slicked, kiss-bruised mouth blooming into a smile.

Barling touched his head with his bandaged hand, lingering over all the places Stanton had worshipped with lips and tongue. The hazy languor was still in his eyes when he looked up. “You did a good job, Hugo.”

With the tonsure, or with the kisses? Stanton quirked an eyebrow, but couldn’t quite bring himself to ask. Instead he smiled. “Is that a thank you, Aelred?”

A becoming blush mantled those pale cheeks, and Barling exhaled what sounded like a huff of amusement. “It will suffice.”

Stanton’s smile became a grin. Suffice? Certainly not. But it would do for the moment.

Now he knew Barling was willing to be enticed from the safety of his self-denial, Stanton could lay his plans. Before they reached London, he’d have Barling in his bed; of that he had no doubt.

And step by step, line by line, they’d discover each other together.


End file.
